POPSCREEN: Backstreet Boys

There was a time when the Backstreet Boys could stand in an airport crooning about the way in which they wanted it, and I was willing to give it to them. But every time Nick Carter reaches his hand out to me in the video for their new single, “Inconsolable,” I don’t grasp wildly at the air in front of me to squeeze it. Instead, I back away warily from the middle-aged man on my TV screen.

The video begins with a heavy-set Carter sprawled out on the beach and jumps from Boy to Boy as they sing their respective parts.

Finally, they unite on a bridge for the chorus and leave little doubt that they’ve mastered the art of contorting their faces in anguish and expressing their feelings with wide arm movements.

One member is conspicuously absent. Kevin Richardson declined to join the good old boys in their comeback video, perhaps because he’s nearing the age of 40.

“Inconsolable” neither hurts nor helps the Boys’ image in any significant way, though it gives an unexpected boost to Howie Dorough.

Almost universally regarded as the least likely to make hearts throb during the boy band years, Dorough looks surprisingly good these days and comes across in “Inconsolable” as the least desperate and most believable of the four.

The video isn’t entirely bad. Admittedly, I will soon know all of the words (or already do), and it could’ve been worse if they had decided to take on a choreographed dance routine. Much worse.

But if they want to relive their glory days, the Backstreet Boys have to do better than “Inconsolable,” because it’s duller than the lead-up to a mid-life crisis.